


A Falling Star

by TeamThor



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Bruce Banner Needs a Hug, Hulk Needs a Hug, Hurt Thor (Marvel), Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Missing Scene, Not Canon Compliant, POV Hulk (Marvel), Protective Hulk (Marvel), but why would you, can be read as platonic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-24
Updated: 2020-02-24
Packaged: 2021-02-27 22:53:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,721
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22883605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TeamThor/pseuds/TeamThor
Summary: An alternate take on the end of Age of Ultron. Hulk saves Thor from the water, and in turn, has some revelations about himself, Bruce, and the Earth in general.
Relationships: Bruce Banner & Thor, Bruce Banner/Thor, Hulk & Thor, Hulk/Thor
Comments: 6
Kudos: 96





	A Falling Star

Hulk didn’t think he truly had his mind made up about the whole ‘leaving earth behind’ thing until the sky began to fall. Until the rocks and rubble began to create waves in an otherwise still ocean, until the lasers and lightning and sparks flew - a morbid painting of light across the afternoon sky. 

It wasn’t that he hadn’t considered the idea before - the idea of being unnatural. He knew he was, and he was fine with that. Banner could hate him, Earth could hate him - he didn’t care. He didn’t come out often enough to care about these people - at least, that’s what he told himself. Part of him maybe knew that was a lie, but that was a part he could blame on Bruce. The sentimental side. 

The human side.

He liked the team, that wasn’t the problem. At least, not exactly. But it seemed that he only liked the team - or, they only liked him - when he could be of use. When it was smokey and bloody and the battleground unfurled below their feet. Outside of that, they weren’t exactly pleased to see him the rare times he reared his head.

Always pleased to see Banner, though. 

And that was why he had stayed. 

Because Banner, like it or not, had a life here. He had friends, he shared a multibillion dollar laboratory with Tony Stark, he ate lunch with Black Widow, he got interplanetary selfies from the God of Thunder. Hulk might not have been missed from the Earth, but it had gotten to the point where Bruce Banner was a loss that many wouldn’t be able to take. 

Until Johannesburg. And then it seemed that the years of cultivating a life, the years of peace, of friendship - it didn’t seem to matter. People wanted both of them dead. Again. Natasha Romanoff had pushed Bruce off of a ledge, Sokovians ran and the sky burned, and Hulk made up his mind.

He could leave this place. All of it. 

Protecting Banner used to mean staying with the team. But now, it seemed like it was starting to mean leaving it. 

Part of him was sad - maybe. Part of him was relieved. Part of him was worried about how Bruce would react to all of this , but he was surprised to note that he wasn’t exactly angry. He was...accepting. This was the way their world ended - with fire, and metal, and one last victory and then he would leave. 

But, as per the usual, their world had different plans for them.  
He’d turned away from the wreckage of the city, towards where the quin-jet lay idle, and had been so close to leaving it all behind - when something caught his eye. 

A streak of crimson, a flash of gold, a hammer falling from a strong grasp turned limp. 

Thor had fallen into the water , and for a few moments, Hulk teetered on the edge of oblivion. Because the quin-jet was there, it was right behind him, he was free. He was close to knowing what freedom actually meant, and surely someone would show up and haul Thor out of the water without needing him. 

They didn't need him.

Stark would fly into the water, or Cap, or maybe strands of red magic would lift the demi-god from the oceans grasp. It didn’t matter, someone would save him. Someone that wasn’t him. 

But no one came. 

He paused, idly kicking at the floor and watching the dust rise and swirl in the wind, waiting for the water to break. The Demigod wasn’t helpless, he knew how to swim. He could get out by himself. He didn’t need Hulk, no one did. 

He counted to ten six times.  
A minute. A minute without Thor breaking the surface, without someone flying in to save him, without him saving himself. 

Hulk didn’t know how to feel about the God of Thunder, not really. He didn’t think anyone on the team did. Because, Thor could drink as many cups of coffee as he pleased, eat as many slices of pizza or watch as many soap-operas on the TV - but that wouldn’t make him human. He didn’t show up all that often - aside from when there was a fight, and people were cautious around him and the strength he wielded. 

In his way, he was a little bit too much like Hulk, and that made Hulk nervous. They didn’t talk about their shared experiences much. Sure, Thor seemed happy when he was fighting alongside him, but he seemed happy with everyone. 

It wasn’t fair that Thor could be so similar to him, but so different. Could get along with people, could be stopped for photographs in the street, could get smiles from Bruce instead of contempt. 

And that was the crux of it all, really. Why he was hesitating to dive in, but still hesitating to leave, still waiting on the cliffside, kicking at rocks. 

Bruce liked Thor. Thor liked Bruce. They were two sides of an equation, two planets orbiting around a sun. They played their games, dancing around the topic, keeping their distances - but Hulk knew Bruce.  
Hulk was supposed to protect Bruce. And if the last thing Bruce saw of Earth was someone he liked, plummeting into the ocean, and knowing that Hulk didn’t try to save him…

That wasn’t protecting. 

The oceans scared Hulk, in a way that he didn’t like to admit. They were too vast, too deep, too unknown and dark and uncertain. Bruce liked them. The Doctor liked discovery, peering into the voids of space and sea with a lantern to cast away the shadows. He’d always had a knack for it, for discovery. For reaching into the depths of knowledge and pulling something out - an idea, a theory, a life changing piece of whatever he was doing for whoever he was doing it for. 

Hulk took a breath, plunging into the water, the fire and brimstone of the world above fading into the background as his hands began to search. 

He didn’t know what Thor thought of the oceans, but he knew that this most likely wasn’t something the Demigod would enjoy. If Thor was anything like him, then he would like warmth. The crushing pressure and the falling debris and the cold, cold currents - they weren’t him. They weren’t them. 

A small nagging feeling of fear began to claw at Hulk’s chest as his hands continued to grab blindly, and find nothing. Left in the cold for too long, a fire would extinguish. A fact from Bruce hovered in his mind - for a flame to live, it needed oxygen, fuel, and heat. A 3 bit recipe for life, drawn up in a neat whiteboard triangle. Thor needed heat. Thor needed him, and if he couldn’t find him, then something was going to happen. 

One of the few embers that could hope to match Hulk’s fire would be gone. 

One of the few people that still cared enough to backtrack and stumble over post-battle comforts would be gone. 

Thor would be gone. Lost and alone in the deep, unable to come home. An asteroid, crashing to earth, unable to return to its place among the star-speckled skies. 

Hulk’s lungs were beginning to burn, when his hand met something familiar. Smooth fabric, weighed down by the water, but the bright red still apparent enough to cut through the blue of the sea. And attached to its tail, was the comet itself.  
Blue eyes closed, blond hair weightless, and golden skin pale under what little sunlight reached them here - but there. 

He wrapped his arms tight around the Demigods middle, tucking him closely to his side, and began to kick. The debris was still falling, but it was no match for his strength. Piles of concrete and half-broken ultron bots sank past him, and he continued to rise. Up towards the sun. Up towards the heat, the land, the air and the sky and somewhere closer to home.  
Hulk broke the surface, roaring with effort as he finally landed onto the shore, still cradling his star in his arms.  
He knelt down, slowly, depositing Thor on the ground as best as he could - hovering over him to try and gauge some sense of life. 

Thor’s skin was cold against his fingertip. And he couldn’t exactly tell beneath the thick layers of armour, but it didn’t seem like he was breathing. 

Hulk bent a little closer, lifting the still-sparking communicator from below the Demigod’s ear. 

"Thor.... Ultron.....-Read me?"

Garbled words spilled out of the device, in a voice that sounded a little like the Captain - but it was too crackly for Hulk to be able to find something recognisable. 

“West of crater,” Hulk grumbled, cradling the electronic in his palm.  
“Come get Blondie.”

"Hulk? Is everything-"

“Come get Blondie.” He repeated, tossing the device to the ground, and once again bending over the unconscious form below him. 

Something stirred in the back of his mind. He wasn’t exactly sure what it was, but he knew how to listen to instructions by now. Knowledge he didn’t remember acquiring lifted his hand, and he pressed it with some force against Thor’s chest. 

Once. Twice. Three times.

Three turned to ten and ten turned to thirty and suddenly, the sky above him split open. A low grumble of thunder answered his call, and Thor twisted below him, hacking coughs spraying water onto the concrete below, one armour-clad hand flailing out and finding a comforting grip against Hulk’s arm. 

He allowed his hand to rest against Thor’s shoulder blades for just a few seconds, turning his gaze towards the skies. 

The quin-jet was moving, and his window was closing. Thor was safe - and that could be his ticket. He’d done something nice for Banner, and now, it was time for something nice for him. His last action here had been something good , and maybe that would be enough to placate Bruce when he next surfaced.

Maybe.

But probably not.  
Hulk got to his feet, gently prying Thor’s hand from his wrist, setting it carefully onto the ground. 

He didn’t know where he was going to go, out in the stars, but he hoped it was somewhere warm. Somewhere near a star, a sun. Somewhere where a comet could find them, someday.


End file.
